All That Man Is (33 page)

So they meet there, in the middle of the afternoon, Hans-Pieter and Maria arriving together.

Maria does not seem pleased to see him – to see Murray, waiting there in his slacks. He tries to be friendly. She isn't having it. She hardly says a word on the bus out to the edge of town, where there is a tatty shopping mall with a few screens embedded in it.

It is then, strap-hanging, that Murray starts to wonder whether this was really such a good idea. The others seem to be deliberately not looking at him. When his and Maria's eyes meet, he tries to smile at her. She looks away immediately and he asks her about the film. ‘So what we going to see then?' he says. ‘Is it any good?' She pretends not to hear him.

Most of the other people in the ticket queue are kids – lads with faceted glass earrings and sagging waistbands and shrieking ladesses in tiny skirts or tracksuits, slurping sugary drinks and throwing popcorn at each other. Among these high-spirited youngsters, with Hans-Pieter and Maria sometimes snogging next to him, Murray sits for two hours, watching the noisy action film. It is dubbed in Croatian and he understands fuck-all.

Afterwards, while Maria is in the ladies, Hans-Pieter tells him they're going back to her place, and asks Murray what he's going to do.

‘I dunno,' Murray says, just standing there in the foyer.

There is a short silence and Murray has the appalling feeling that Hans-Pieter is pitying him – that fucking
Hans-Pieter
is feeling sorry for
him
.

Well, fuck that.

‘Don't you worry,' he says. ‘I've got things to do. You give her one from me, okay?' And with an unpleasant smile, he nods towards Maria, who is approaching them.

He spends the next few hours in Džoker, drinking Pan lager and thinking, If the likes of Hans-Pieter can sort himself out with a woman, then
I
sure as fuck can.

Matteus nods.

Without meaning to, Murray had said it aloud. Matteus, tall and austere, possessor of a monastic vibe, is taking glasses out of the dishwasher and putting them on a shelf under the bar.

It is not even eight o'clock, and Murray is already quite drunk.

In Oaza later, he happens on Damjan.

They are sitting at a table together in the kebab shop and Murray is saying, ‘If the likes of Hans-Pieter can sort himself out with a woman, then
I
sure as fuck can.' Inelegantly, he is eating a kebab.

Damjan says, ‘Sure.' He and his friend have already finished, were about to leave when Murray arrived. They talk in Croatian, the two of them – a muttered wry exchange of words. Murray, shoving the last wet mess of the kebab into his mouth, wonders what they are talking about.

‘What you gonna do now?' he asks, wiping his lips with a paper napkin.

Damjan's friend, it turns out, speaks perfect English. He sounds like an American.

‘We're gonna go party,' he says, grinning. ‘You wanna come?'

‘Fuck, yeah,' Murray says. ‘Good man. Let's go.'

As they leave, one of the twins says something to Damjan.

The kebab shop is owned by Albanian twins, identical, of vaguely thuggish appearance. Shaved, spherical heads. Fleshy noses. Strong necks and heavy eyebrows. Murray can never tell them apart. At first he didn't realise there were two of them; then one day he saw them together. They usually sit out on the terrace in front, under the awning where a water-feature tinkles, puffing at a hookah and drinking tea. Other, more desperate-looking men – often with moustaches – hang out with them there, and any number of women, young and old. A souped-up white Honda Accord EX 2.2 litre diesel is frequently parked in front of the shop, which Murray assumes must be owned by one of them.

And he envies the way one of them nods at Damjan as they leave, and offers him a few words of farewell. He wishes the twins would acknowledge
him
like that. He has been eating their kebabs for over a year, and he has always felt that he and they share something, something that sets them apart from the other people in this place, a superiority of some sort. And yet they never speak to him, as one of them just spoke to Damjan, or acknowledge him in any way.

On the spur of the moment Murray decides that he will be the first to speak. The twin who spoke to Damjan is standing there, near the door, slouching against the jamb, and poking about in his mouth with a toothpick.

‘Al
right
,' Murray says to him, forcefully he hopes, as he passes him on the way out.

And the twin just looks slightly surprised – in his collarless shirt, his tan leather jacket – and watches Murray leave.

And how the fuck did that happen?

Safely in his mausoleum, hugging the toilet, Murray weeps. Drops tears onto the filthy floor.

How did that happen?

He has never been so intimate with the root of this toilet, with the rusty bolts that hold it to the old linoleum.

He sits up, after a while, and dries his eyes.

He inspects, in the mirror, his fat lip.

This mirror always gives the impression of fog. His face looms out of it, damaged. He stares at himself with contempt.

There was a woman. Aye, there was a woman. There were lots of women. With Damjan and his friend he had trawled through the nightspots of the town – two or three of them, there were. Nightspots. Full of students, kids. No success there, though he had tried, God knows. He had tried in the noise of the new music to have it off with a few of them. Kids with dyed hair. And Murray leering over them, trying to make himself understood. Shouting about the S-Class he had once owned. Shouting, ‘You been to London?' Shouting, ‘I'll show you round, okay?' He had offered her a job, that one. And she was about to give him her number, he thinks, when her friends pulled her away. (Later, seen her being sick in the car park. Was it her?) Damjan's friend disappeared. So just him and Damjan went on to the all-night place. ‘I know one place,' Damjan said, speaking more fluently than usual. ‘I know one place is open all night.' Taxi. Yes, taxi. And then tumble out into the raw air again. Damjan paying. ‘You got any smokes?' Murray asking him. And then the place. The woman, perched up there on her stool. Not a kid, this one. Or maybe he was perched on the stool and she was there, suddenly, talking to him. And he was telling her about the S-Class he had once owned. Asking her, ‘You been to London?' She was, what? Forty? Fifty? And no oil painting. Even then, in the state he was in, he knew that. She kept touching him. Hand on his leg. (And where was Damjan?) Hand on his leg. And he said to her, straight out, ‘You wanna come back to mine?'

And she just nodded, and moved her hand up his leg.

‘Okay then,' he said.

‘A minute,' she said, squeezing his leg. ‘Wait.'

‘Okay then,' he said. And waited, feeling pleased with himself. And then starting to worry about whether he'd be able to do it, the state he was in. And he looked for her and saw her talking to two men near the toilets. And something about the way she was talking to them made him understand. He just wanted out of it then. He slid off the stool, trying to keep his footing, and started to move towards the door. And then she was holding his arm. Holding it hard. ‘Okay?' she said, ‘we go?' ‘Look, I'm tired,' he told her, trying to pull his arm free, ‘I'll see you another time.' ‘Don't say that,' she said, her hand on his trousers, feeling for something. ‘I'm fucking tired,' he snapped, shoving her away. Outside, the cold night air. Haloed street lamps. He started to walk quickly, not knowing where he was. And yes, those were footsteps following him, and as soon as he started to jog, hands seizing him. Threw him against the side of a parked van. The two men. Faceless in the shadows. His voice emerging as an effeminate squawk: ‘What d'you want?' There were various issues. He had, they seemed to be telling him, entered into an agreement. So he owed them money. And he had hit her, they said. They wanted more money for that. ‘I did not hit her'. Everything he had on him, seemed to be what they wanted. ‘I never hit her …' He took a punch to the face. Then, from a position on the pavement, handed over his wallet, and they emptied it of kuna and threw it on top of him.

And then he was alone, lying on a wet pavement, wondering if he was in fact dreaming.
Please, let me be dreaming

His mouth seemed to be the wrong shape. Near his eyes, something … What
was
that?

Hubcap.

Fuck.

Hubcap of a …

Toyota Yaris?

Dizzy when he stood up.

And sick. Suddenly he felt very sick.

*

Two days later, when his mouth has deflated, he emerges and finds Hans-Pieter in the Umorni Putnik.

‘I heard about your night out,' Hans-Pieter says.

‘Yeah, that. It was quite a night.'

‘I heard it,' Hans-Pieter says.

It is some time in the afternoon. Maria is working, is there.

‘Oh, yeah?' Murray wants to know, smiling worriedly. ‘What'd you hear?'

‘Damjan said it was a good night.'

Murray's smile turns less worried. He says, ‘A fucking massive night, actually.'

‘You've been recovering,' Hans-Pieter asks, ‘since then?'

‘That's right. In the recovery position. If you know what I mean.' Murray himself isn't sure what he means. He tastes his lager, the first that has passed his lips since then.

Yesterday he experienced a sort of dark afternoon of the soul. Some hours of terrible negativity. A sense, essentially, that he had wasted his entire life, and now it was over. The sun was shining outside.

As it is now, igniting the yellow of the leaves that still cling to the little trees in front of the hostel.

He sees them through the dusty window.

‘How about you?' he asks Hans-Pieter. ‘You okay?'

‘I'm okay,' Hans-Pieter says.

Murray sees one of the leaves detach and drop.

Hans-Pieter says, ‘Damjan says you were sort of on the pull, the other night.'

‘What –
I
was?'

‘That's what he said.'

Murray does something with his mouth, something uneasy. ‘Don't know about that.'

‘Well,' Hans-Pieter says, ‘I know a very nice lady, you might be interested in.'

‘Who's that then?' Murray asks snootily.

‘A very nice lady,' Hans-Pieter says again. Then he whispers, ‘Maria's mudder.'

In a savage whisper Murray says, ‘Maria's
mother
?'

‘Yes.'

‘No fucking
way.
'

‘Why not?'

‘Fuck off,' Murray scoffs.

‘Why not? She's quite young …'

‘What's that mean?'

‘Forty-eight, I tink. And she's in nice shape,' Hans-Pieter tell him.

‘You've seen her, have you?'

‘Sure.'

Maria, having no one to serve, has ventured out in search of empties. She stops at Hans-Pieter's shoulders, puts her hands on them. Her substantial hip is smack in Murray's line of sight.

‘I was just telling Murray,' Hans-Pieter says to her, half-turning his head, ‘about your mother.'

‘Yeah?' she smiles. She seems to have forgiven Murray for the way he tagged along to
Iron Man 3
with them the other day. It occurs to him, in fact, that the way he tagged along that day might actually have
suggested
to her the idea of fixing him up with her obviously lonely and desperate mother.

‘Just take her out for a drink,' Hans-Pieter … what? Suggests? Orders? Murray is still wondering what to make of this development – fucking
Hans-Pieter
telling him what to do – when Maria says, ‘She's really pretty. And much thinner than me.'

‘We won't hold dat against her,' Hans-Pieter says, almost suavely.

‘She's always telling me I should lose weight.'

‘Don't listen to her.'

‘It's true – I should.'

‘Absolutely not,' Hans-Pieter tells her. And then says to Murray, ‘So will you do it? Take her for a drink?'

It's awkward, saying something like, ‘Not on your life, no fucking
way
,' with Maria standing there, still smiling at him, a piece of pink-dyed hair falling over her eye.

‘You got a picture?' he asks her after a few moments. ‘I mean, on your phone or something?'

‘Maybe,' she says. ‘Yeah, here.'

Leaning forward over Hans-Pieter's shoulder, she passes Murray her phone.

He looks.

A woman holding a cat. Not very easy to make out. Thinner than Maria, yes. Okay? Maybe.

‘What about your father?' he asks, handing back the phone without saying anything about the photo, and smirking. ‘He won't mind?'

‘He lives in Austria,' she says. ‘And they're divorced. Obviously.'

‘Obviously,' Murray says. It had been a joke. He had assumed that her father wasn't still on the scene. ‘Okay,' he says. ‘I'll give it a go.'

‘Do you want her number then?' Maria asks.

‘She speaks English, does she?'

‘Of course.'

‘Or why don't you call her?' he suggests, suddenly nervous. ‘Set it up.'

Leaning on his shoulder, she looks at Hans-Pieter, wanting his opinion, perhaps even his permission.

‘Sure,' Hans-Pieter says. ‘Set it up.'

Without warning, another leaf detaches itself from one of the trees outside and drops down to the pavement.

On his way home, a few hours later, Murray stops at Oaza to pick up a kebab. The plastic sign – palm tree, smiling camel – is illuminated in the gloom. One of the Albanian twins is standing around near the entrance, keeping an eye on things. He does not acknowledge Murray, and Murray, after a moment's hesitation, says nothing to him either. Having ordered in English, he just waits there for his kebab, eyeing the slices of baklava as if wondering whether to have one. He wishes more than ever that the twins would offer him some sign, some little sign, that they looked on him as an equal – as an equal, no more than that. Damjan had been honoured with a nod, a few words, had been thereby elevated in Murray's estimation. He thinks more highly of Damjan now. The baklavas shine, sodden with honey. Yes, Damjan seems in some way superior to him now.